


The Lines of Tewdr and Castile

by Mercia12591



Series: Tales from the Ancestral Tudor Court [7]
Category: The Spanish Princess (TV), The Tudors (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:15:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29218587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mercia12591/pseuds/Mercia12591
Summary: Henry and Kathryn ponder the doubleganger godchildren who carry the future of their two ancient lines…
Relationships: Catherine of Aragon/Henry VIII of England
Series: Tales from the Ancestral Tudor Court [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2007481
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	The Lines of Tewdr and Castile

**Wiltshire England – December 16, 1991**

**T** **he** December evening was passing in a most agreeable fashion as the Henry VIII’s Ancestral Court celebrated Kathryn of Aragon’s birthday. The lady of the hour looked as radiant as Henry had ever seen her. She danced every dance, delighting the courtiers and making Henry feel lighter and happier than he had in centuries.

To see Kathryn smile, to see her this happy was like seeing the sun breakthrough after a rainstorm. It was glorious and Henry VIII found himself basking in the warmth and light which followed in the true queen’s wake. She truly was a wonder.

Henry was however very aware that he was not the only one who recognized Kathryn’s worth, he now had to contend with rivals for his queen’s affections, foremost of these being Arthur Tudor himself, who in recent years had taken to following Kathryn around like a lost puppy. It was beyond irksome to witness, but the sure knowledge that Kathryn felt nothing beyond pity for the rose petal went a long way towards keeping Henry’s irritation in check.

Edward Stafford was a bigger worry for Henry and he knew he had only himself to blame. If he had been a better husband to Kathryn in life they’d be together now, in every way. Instead, his own personal purgatory was having to watch her from afar, being close enough to touch and yet still worlds apart…

The king’s musings were interrupted by Jacquetta River’s sudden entrance. Kathryn stopped mid-action and the Lady River’s nodded as the two women communicated without words. Henry watched as Kathryn left the great hall in a flurry of crimson velvet.

“It seems your Grace’s second god-child is on the way,” Jacquetta informed her great-grandson on her way back out of the hall.

Startled by the news Henry followed her into the passageway. “What? That’s way too early!”

“Early it may be, but she is coming nevertheless, Harry.”

Not arguing any further Henry rushed to catch up to Kathryn. Her carriage was just about to depart when Henry reached it and gained entrance. “I’m coming with you,” he told her and she simply nodded as the carriage took off at the speed of thought.

“Everything will be fine, Kate.”

“It’s so early, Harry, too early…”

“We have to keep the faith, Summertime.”

She smiled slightly at the old nickname. “I’m trying Harry.”

*** 

The birth was treacherous and because there was no time to get the expectant first-time mother to the hospital, two midwives from the nearby village were hurriedly summoned to the Wiltshire castle where Michelle Fitzgerald Castile had gone into sudden and wholly unexpected labor.

It was clear at various points in the process that the midwives feared for the lives of both mother and child. No one noticed the strange, ethereal couple, dressed in Tudor clothes and hidden in the shadows of the impromptu birthing room.

It was a quarter to twelve when Catalina Charlotte of Castile took her first breath, announcing her entrance into the world with an ear-splitting wail. The mother and the newborn infant was rushed to the nearest hospital where the best medical care scientific advances and money could provide ensured that both mother and child would pull through.

**Wiltshire Castle Nursery, the Mortal Realms – 1 January 1992**

“She’s so perfect!” Kathryn whispered to Henry as they stood by the baby girl’s cot.

“She’s beautiful,” Henry agreed with a bright smile. “She looks like you.”

“Nonsense,” Kathryn shot back good-naturedly. “She’s much prettier.” As she spoke Kathryn reached into the cot, gently lifting the tiny girl out and into her arms. The little girl awoke with a tiny sigh, big blue eyes staring unafraid into the admiring gazes of her two ghostly godparents.

“Do you want to hold her?” Kathryn asked Henry, as she cooed at the tiny baby girl.

Henry eagerly agreed as he took Catalina from Kathryn and was delighted when the baby gave him a ‘smile.’

“It’s gas,” Kathryn deadpanned with a cheeky grin.

“Don’t mind her. She’s just jealous,” Henry told his new goddaughter in a stage whisper.

Kathryn merely laughed and she was about to ask the little girl back from Henry when they both heard tiny footsteps coming quickly down the hall. Henry placed the little girl back in her cot as he and Kathryn melted into the shadows of the room. Moments later two-year-old Henry Tewdr waddled into the room. Without looking left or right, the toddler headed straight for the cot and proceeded to laboriously pull up a chair. 

From their place in the shadows, the ghostly couple watched as the cherubic little boy with the mess of dark curls scampered his way up and onto the highbacked chair. When he got to the top he stood upright on the chair from where he looked down on the baby girl in her cot, his blue eyes sparkling.

“Hi Catalina,” he greeted her in a whisper before proceeding to tell her all about his day in an animated fashion. It was clear to the couple in the shadows that this was not the first-time little Henry Tewdr had done this and their suspicions were confirmed a few moments later when a frazzled-looking nanny entered the room to scold the young boy.

“Master Harry, how many times have I told you, you can’t be in here!”

“But she’s lonely Nanny Francis,” the boy protested, “I’m only keeping her company.” 

The nanny came to take the boy from the chair, but the boy stood with arms crossed across his tiny chest. “Can’t I hold her just for a little while, please?”

At first, it seemed that the nanny might refuse the boy’s request, but then she relented with a long-suffering sigh and, taking Catalina out of her crib, instructed young Henry Tewdr on the proper way to hold the infant.

“Remember how I showed you before,” the nurse admonished, her words making it clear once more that it wasn’t the first time, she’d supervised the young boy thus. “We can’t stay long young master, only a couple of minutes,” she reminded.

Young Henry merely nodded somewhat distractedly as he took a seat on the chair, his eyes never leaving the infant he cradled in his tiny arms…and from their place in the shadows the two children’s ghostly godparents looked on with pride and a strange new sensation in their chest, a feeling which felt suspiciously like hope.

***

“You said she’d miscarry, that the brat would be still-born,” the male voice said, having a definite accusatory tone to it.

“She did come early,” a woman’s voice retorted defensively, and her male companion snorted.

“Not early enough since the child is reported to be alive and thriving!” The male shot back wrinkling his nose in disgust at the smells emanating from the dark alleyway in Ancestral London’s ‘cheap-side’, where the pair’s illicit meeting was taking place.

“We’ll just try again,” the woman said, “target the child directly instead of the mother, as it was done with Henry Duke of Cornwall…”

“Except that Jacquetta Rivers have reset the wards around both children, she is hyper-vigilant now,” the man said with thinly veiled irritation. “We have missed a golden opportunity, but there will be others and perhaps poison is not the best way…there are other ways to derail this…"


End file.
